&  Ik  ‘ 


Th  e  Art/ 
esultful  Letter 
Writing 

^yRobert  Ruxfon 


Mailbag  Publishing  Gompany 
Cleveland. 


THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  ILLINOIS 
LIBRARY 

65/.  3 

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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2017  with  funding  from 

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1 


uKivERsmr 


The  Art  of 
Resultful  Letter 


Writing 

by  Robert  Ruxton 


Mailbag  Publishing  Company 

Cleveland 


1  1  %  lo 


VSl-^ 

INTRODUCTION 


THE  chapters  comprising  The  Art  of  Re¬ 
sultful  Letter  Writing  were  published 
originally  as  a  series  of  articles  in  The 
Mailbag ,  a  Magazine  of  Direct-Mail  Advertising. 

These  articles,  it  will  be  observed,  came  from 
the  authoritative  pen  of  Mr.  Robert  Ruxton, 
Chief  of  Copy  Staff  of  one  of  the  great  Direct- 
by-Mail  advertising  organizations  of  America. 

The  principles  expounded  are  being  constantly 
examplified  by  the  author  who  maintains  a 
remarkable  record  of  highly  consistent  results 
marked  at  frequent  periods  by  successes  that 
are  best  described  as  spectacular  and  dramatic. 
Believing  the  principles  and  practices  ex- 
expounded  by  the  author  as  responsible  for  his 
success  are  worthy  of  wide  circulation  in  a  form 
that  will  ensure  their  easy  preservation  for  refer¬ 
ence  purposes  we  have  embodied  them  in  this 
brochure  which  we  present  to  the  business 
world  in  the  sincere  hope  that  it  will  prove  a 
constructive  business  force  and  aid  in  the 
betterment  of  correspondence  and  written  sales 
work. 

I 


Tim  Thrift 
Editor,  The  Mailbag 


Copyright,  1918,  by 
Mailbag  Publishing  Company 


The  Art  of  Resultful 
Letter  Writing 

By  Robert  Ruxton 


CHAPTER  ONE 

IT  is  worth  a  great  deal  of  money  to  know  how 
to  write  a  resultful  business  letter;  I  speak 
from  experience,  having,  as  a  composer  of 
business  letters,  unexampled  opportunities  for 
seeing  just  what  the  right  kind  of  letters  are 
capable  of. 

For  instance,  I  know  of  one  letter  that  main¬ 
tains  a  business  house  in  New  York  employing 
some  ten  people,  and  which  yields  the  proprietor, 
over  and  above  all  expenses,  an  income  of  ap¬ 
proximately  one  hundred  dollars  weekly. 

I  know  of  another  letter  that  maintains  a  big 
collection  business  in  the  lower  end  of  Manhat¬ 
tan  Island.  This  business  is  now  run  by  a 
woman  who  inherited  it  on  the  death  of  her 
husband;  absolutely  without  business  knowledge 
of  any  kind,  she  was  compelled  to  lean  on  this 
letter  for  support  and  its  automatic  mailing  to 
certain  specified  lists  of  people  has  enabled  her 
to  maintain  what  is  a  profitable  business,  and 
to  provide  her  two  sons  with  a  fine  education, 
and  a  beautiful  home  in  expensive  apartments 
up- town. 

These  are  merely  chance  recollections  of  what 
a  single  letter,  used  continuously  day  after  day 


4 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


and  year  after  year,  is  capable  of  doing,  and 
from  this  angle  I  have  always  been  very  much 
impressed  with  the  fact  that  a  single  good  letter 
of  the  right  kind,  mailed  to  the  right  list  of  peo¬ 
ple,  is  frequently  worth  more  to  its  possessor 
than  a  big  investment  in  Government  3  Per 
Cents. 

The  writer,  in  attempting  to  show  how  to 
compose  a  resultful  business  letter,  will  ask  that  he 
be  acquitted  of  any  idea  of  personal  egotism 
or  personal  advertising  if  he  brings  the  fact 
rather  prominently  forward  that  he  has  for 
years  been  engaged  by  a  great  number  of  busi¬ 
ness  firms  in  originating  letters  different  to 
what  they  were  sending  out,  and  designed,  of 
course,  to  get  them  bigger  business,  because  this 
fact  has  a  very  large  bearing  and  significance 
on  one  point  that  I  desire  to  make  and  here 
emphasize  with  as  much  power  as  I  can,  and 
that  point  is  this, — 

Exceedingly  few  of  the  firms  that  order 
letters  from  me  ever  dream  of  sending  with 
the  order  a  copy  of  the  letter-head  upon  which 
the  letter  is  to  be  written  and  sent  out ,  or  a 
specimen  of  the  envelope  in  which  said  letter 
is  to  be  enclosed. 

Here  then  is  a  very  important  clue  as  to  the 
reason  why  many  good  letters  fail  to  get  the 
expected  results — the  writer  simply  overlooks 
the  importance  of  the  letter-head  on  which  he 
writes  that  letter. 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


5 


YOUR  LETTER-HEAD  PHOTOGRAPHS  YOU  TO  THE 
PROSPECT. 

When  you  send  a  letter  to  a  man,  recollect 
that  you  do  not  go  to  him  yourself,  and  neither 
does  he  come  to  you.  Your  personality  has  no 
chance  to  influence  the  deal.  Your  office  and 
surroundings  have  no  chance  to  influence  the 
deal.  The  only  thing  that  can  influence  the 
deal  is  the  look  of  the  letter,  and  what  is  said 
in  the  letter.  The  average  man  is  well  aware  of 
the  value  of  appearances  in  the  climb  for  busi¬ 
ness  success.  He  keeps  himself  dressed  well 
and  he  keeps  his  offices  and  surroundings  look¬ 
ing  as  well  as  he  possibly  can  because  he  realizes 
that  these  things  go  a  long  way  in  getting  and 
closing  business. 

It  has  been  said,  “Clothes  don’t  make  the 
man,”  and  it  has  also  been  said,  “The  apparel 
oft  proclaims  the  man.”  It  remained  for  a 
Russian  philosopher  to  combine  the  two  max¬ 
ims  when  he  said,  “You  are  introduced  to  a  man 
by  his  clothes  and  you  know  him  by  his  char¬ 
acter.”  Keep  this  maxim  in  mind  when  you 
sit  down  to  write  a  business-winning  letter, 
remembering  its  mission  is  to  introduce  you  right 
to  the  favorable  attention  of  your  prospect;  see 
that  this  is  done  by  the  message  being  carried  on 
the  right  kind  of  letter-head  in  the  right  kind  of 
envelope. 

The  slightest  reflection  on  this  subject  will 
show  that  all  a  man  has  to  judge  you  by,  in  a 
business  solicitation  through  the  mails,  is  the 


6 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


thing  that  the  postman  hands  him,  representing 
the  envelope  and  letter-head  carrying  the  busi¬ 
ness  message;  these  flash  through  the  eye,  to  the 
brain,  a  mental  image  or  photograph  upon 
which  the  prospect  acts.  If,  in  lieu  of  a  letter, 
you  were  required  to  send  the  business  prospect 
a  personal  photograph  of  yourself  or  of  your 
business  offices  and  surroundings,  it  is  safe  to 
say  you  would  not  send  a  photograph  that  would 
either  not  do  you  justice  or  that  would  actually 
misrepresent  your  business,  yet  this  is  pre¬ 
cisely  the  thing  that  a  good  business  firm  does 
when  it  sends  its  message  out  on  a  poor  letter¬ 
head. 

BUY  MENTAL,  NOT  PRESS  IMPRESSIONS. 

In  London,  Paris,  or  New  York  there  are 
any  amount  of  men  doing  business  on  their 
nerve — and  their  letter-head.  The  financial 
faker  of  Wall  Street  realizes  to  the  full  the  power, 
strength  and  business-winning  qualities  of  the 
letter-head  upon  which  he  writes  his  message, 
and  it  goes  out  finely  engraved  or  finely  em¬ 
bossed  on  the  finest  procurable  kind  of  bond 
paper,  enclosed  in  an  envelope  that  crinkles  and 
crackles  like  a  five-pound  Bank  of  England 
note.  Such  a  letter  conveys  an  atmosphere  of 
financial  strength  and  reputation  that  couldn’t 
be  got  in  any  other  way.  Men  of  this  stamp 
know  the  value — the  commercial  value — of  the 
right  kind  of  letter-head  and  willingly  pay  from 
thirty  dollars  to  one  hundred  dollars  per  thous¬ 
and  for  them  because  they  realize  that  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


7 


engraver  or  embosser  or  printer  is  but  the 
vehicle  through  which  they  are  buying  favorable 
mental  impressions.  Does  any  legitimate  reason 
exist  why  a  reliable,  responsible  house  should 
use  poor  letter-heads,  and  the  unreliable,  irre¬ 
sponsible  house  the  best  letter-heads  that  are 
procurable? 

In  considering  a  point  like  this  we  should 
bear  in  mind  the  historical  fact  that,  although 
the  sway  maintained  on  the  mind  of  Queen 
Elizabeth  by  the  celebrated  Dudley,  Earl  of 
Essex,  was  undoubtedly  due  to  the  exercise  of 
his  remarkable  mental  powers,  yet  he  was  a 
firm  believer  in  the  value  of  dress  as  a  supple¬ 
mental  aid  to  a  career,  as  we  see  in  his  reply  to 
his  brother,  the  Earl  of  Suffolk,  who  reproved 
him,  saying,  “Parts  like  yours  need  no  such 
varieties.”  Dudley  replied:  “The  writing  of  a 
clerkly  scribe  takes  not  from  the  wisdom  of  the 
epistle,  but  rather  tempts  to  a  frequent  perusal 
thereof.  Why  should  a  well-fashioned  exterior 
or  a  nice  casket  lessen  the  value  of  the  jewel 
within  it?” 

Following  my  own  mental  processes  I  can 
personally  say  that  my  decisions  in  all  mail¬ 
order  transactions  are  swayed  very  largely  by 
the  look  and  appearance  of  the  envelope  and 
what  I  take  out  of  it.  I  class  the  firm  or  the 
writer  as  good,  bad  or  indifferent  after  such  a 
scrutiny,  and  subsequent  business  relations  are 
naturally  strongly  influenced  by  the  decision  I 
have  mentally  reached. 


8 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


A  number  of  years  ago  I  was  handling  a 
business  upon  which  decisions  as  to  cash  or 
credit  had  to  be  largely  reached  by  the  look  of 
the  letter.  The  credit  door  was  shut  to  many, 
and  opened  to  many,  and  looking  back  I  can 
recall  very  few  errors  of  judgment  made  in  the 
light  of  subsequent  experiences.  I  remember 
particularly  where  a  very  large  line  of  business 
hung  on  the  question  of  extending  credit  or 
otherwise.  I  was  called  into  consultation  on 
the  matter,  sized  up  letter-head  and  envelope, 
and  recommended  unlimited  credit  on  the 
account.  I  could  just  feel  that  the  firm  was 
right. 

RECOGNIZE  YOUR  PRINTER  AS  A  VALUABLE 
BUSINESS-GETTING  FACTOR. 

I  personally  have  always  appreciated  the 
value  of  a  first  class  letter-head  and  have  seen 
a  great  many  demonstrations  of  such  value.  I 
take  long  yachting  cruises  and  at  times  need 
things  that  it  is  not  possible  to  get  in  out  of  the 
way  towns  or  villages  and  it  becomes  necessary 
to  send  to  big  centers  like  Chicago,  New  York 
or  San  Francisco.  Frequently  the  proposed 
transaction  involves  a  C.  O.  D.,  or  the  shipment 
of  something  on  credit  through  the  price  not 
being  known  when  being  ordered,  and  it  has  been 
my  experience  that  the  letter-head  carrying  the 
order  has  been  a  very  important  factor  in  secur¬ 
ing  the  prompt  action  so  earnestly  desired. 

If  this  preliminary  chapter  will  make  clear  the 
fact  that  the  look,  feel  and  appearance  of  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


9 


envelope  and  letter-head  are  frequently  equal 
to  a  business  rating  or  recommendation  it  will 
have  accentuated  a  point  that  in  my  opinion 
has  not  been  accentuated  enough  in  the  minds 
of  business  men;  therefore  I  have  opened  this 
series  of  articles  in  the  form  of  a  plea  or  brief 
for  the  printer,  embosser,  engraver  and  paper 
maker,  asking  men  who  wish  to  buy  good 
mental  impressions  to  go  to  such  men  and  pro¬ 
cure  from  them  the  very  best  they  know  how 
to  deliver,  simply  because  it  will  pay,  and  will 
pay  big. 

In  chapters  following  I  will  show  what  princi¬ 
ples  I  follow  in  the  construction  of  the  message 
that  goes  on  the  letter-head,  in  such  fashion,  I 
hope,  as  will  show  any  man  of  ordinary  ability 
how  to  construct  a  resultful  business  letter 
according  to  principles  as  final  and  as  funda¬ 
mental  as  are  the  rules  of  mathematics;  I  will 
endeavor  to  show  how  to  use  letters  to  the  best 
advantage  and  point  out  errors  in  circulariza¬ 
tion  that  are  committed  by  a  great  number  of 
business  men  and  which  are  responsible  for  an 
enormous  loss  annually  to  the  business  houses 
of  America. 


CHAPTER  TWO 


" And  shouldst  thou  ask  my  judgment  of  that  which  hath  most  profit 
in  the  world , 

For  answer  take  thou  this:  The  prudent  penning  of  a  letter — Tupper. 

IN  the  previous  chapter  I  laid  great  stress  on 
the  importance  of  typing  the  business-win¬ 
ning  letter  on  the  right  kind  of  letter¬ 
head,  and  on  mailing  the  right  kind  of  business¬ 
winning  letter  in  the  right  kind  of  business¬ 
winning  envelope.  I  hope  the  big  idea  sunk  in: 
Persuasion  is  a  big  business-winning  factor  but 
Appearance  equals  it.  A  letter  swings  on  just 
such  a  see-saw — Persuasion  at  one  end  and 
Appearance  at  the  other.  The  mistake  of  most 
writers  is  to  either  give  Persuasion  more  than 
half  the  plank  or  Appearance.  In  either  event 
the  game  is  spoiled. 

Consider  the  printer,  my  friends — consider 
him  in  his  rightful  relation  to  you,  provided  he 
is  a  good  printer — a  factor  and  a  very  important 
factor  in  getting  you  the  results  you  crave,  and, 
in  dealing  with  him,  say  this  to  yourself  over 
and  over  again: 

“I  am  not  buying  press  impressions,  but  I 
am  buying  mental  impressions.” 

Now,  what  else  makes  a  letter  “Pull”? 

The  message  of  course. 

How  are  you  to  get  that  message? 

Precisely  as  the  engineer  generates  power — 
by  concentrating  a  ton  or  more  of  coal  under  a 


12 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


ton  or  more  of  water  confined  in  a  boiler  to 
which  piston  and  flywheel  and  factory  are 
attached. 

Turn  your  mind,  on  your  business — that’s 
the  fire  that  makes  the  steam  that  turns  the 
wheels  that  make  your  business  go. 

If  you  look  at  your  business  intently  enough 
you  will  realize  perhaps  what  you  have  never 
realized  before — that  it  is  a  thing  managed  by 
you  that  is  giving  a  service  to  your  fellow  men. 
And, — 

As  you  look  and  as  you  ponder,  you  will 
begin  to  aspire  to  give  a  better  and  more  perfect 
service ,  first  because  you  will  realize  that  your 
material  success  hinges  on  that,  and  second 
because  you  will  more  or  less  imperfectly  realize 
that  service  to  the  world  is  the  intent  of  the 
power  that  works  through  you  and  which  men 
call  God. 

Some  men  arrive  at  true  service  with  their 
eyes  fixed  on  profit  while  others  arrive  at  profit 
with  their  eyes  fixed  on  service.  The  “profit” 
route  is  the  dangerous  way.  The  service  route 
is  the  safe  way.  The  man  who  gives  the  world 
service  is  of  use  to  the  world,  the  world  will  use 
him,  and,  in  the  process  he  will  profit.  The  man 
who  takes  profit  from  the  world  may  forget 
service  in  the  white  light  of  the  dollars  he 
takes  in. 

Why  this  dissertation? 

Simply  because  I  want  to  impress  on  you  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


13 


fact  that  I  cannot  teach  you  how  to  advertise 
your  business  unless  the  business  is  forcing  you 
to  advertise  it.  If  you  don’t  feel  that  “urge” 
you  are  not  looking  at  your  business  as  you 
should  and  nothing  can  make  it  grow.  A  suc¬ 
cessful  business  is  merely  the  crystallization  of  a 
frame  of  mind. 

Turn  the  fire  of  your  mind  on  your  business 
and  advertising  power  will  generate. 

And  now,  about  the  structure  of  that  letter; 
your  message  literally  glows  within  you  and 
craves  for  utterance ;  here’s  the  crucial  point; 
utterance  involves  technique,  and  technique 
the  average  man  lacks. 

I  once  saw  a  little  one  act  drama;  the  lover 
loved  as  only  a  lover  can — but  he  couldn’t 
express  it;  when  his  sweetheart  came  his  very 
fervor  struck  him  dumb;  he  lacked  the  skill  to 
crystallize  the  words  that  would  reach  the  brain 
of  his  sweetheart  through  her  ear;  then  came 
his  sweetheart’s  friend — a  sympathetic  young 
girl  with  the  gift  of  intuition  and  expression, 
who,  sensing  the  situation,  translated  to  her 
companion  in  eloquent,  glowing  words  the  love 
the  lover  felt. 

Later  came  the  villains,  intent  on  abduction 
— here  the  psychical  resigned  to  the  physical; 
action  was  called  for  and  the  lover,  in  his  ele¬ 
ment,  expressed  himself  defending  his  lady-love 
and  her  companion  against  tremendous  odds, 
his  good  sword  finding  heart  and  throat  till  the 
attackers  lay  dead  and  wounded  around  him. 


14 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


and  he,  gasping  and  fainting  from  loss  of  blood, 
supported  at  the  last  by  his  lady-love  madly 
imploring  him  to  live  because  she  loved  him. 

And  of  course  he  lived. 

I  often  think  of  that  little  drama  in  relation 
to  business — of  thousands  upon  thousands  of 
business  men  rendering  service  through  action  to 
a  limited  constituency,  powerless  to  express 
that  service  through  words  to  the  enormously 
larger  constituency  just  beyond. 

The  little  business  or  shop,  well  kept  as  to 
windows  and  stock,  is  moving  in  the  compara¬ 
tively  little  circle  bounded  by  those  people  who 
come  to  or  pass  that  shop — to  the  greater  world 
beyond  those  boundaries  the  proprietor  is  dumb. 

Letters  interpret  the  business  to  the  larger 
circle  of  buyers  as  the  companion  interpreted 
the  lover  to  his  mistress,  and  the  man  unable 
to  express  himself  should  seek  the  services  of 
those  who  can — those  who,  intuitively,  sympa¬ 
thetically  and  skillfully  crystallize  the  ideals  of 
the  business  into  persuasive  selling  words,  and 
win  the  heart  of  the  great  buying  constituency 
around. 

Business  consists  of  men  who  are  making 
goods,  distributing  goods,  and  selling  goods.  It 
is  wise  to  determine  in  which  circle  you  are  and 
to  confine  your  efforts  to  the  business  you  are 
in.  My  province,  for  instance,  throughout  my 
life  has  been  selling  goods  by  the  written  word. 
I  never  attempt  to  make  them.  Thousands  I 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


15 


know  who  make  goods  attempt  to  sell  them. 
The  result  is  usually  disastrous. 

From  which  we  may  deduce  that  it  is  bad  for 
anyone  not  possessing  the  faculty  of  expression 
to  attempt  a  business  love-tale  to  the  public. 
Precisely  because  men  attempt  it  do  they  damn 
letters  as  resultless. 

But, — 

If  you  do  possess  that  faculty,  go  to  it — 
cultivate  it— it  is  a  precious  jewel  worth  more 
to  you  than  your  shop,  stock  and  good  will, 
because  by  its  light  and  glow  you  will  be  able 
to  reflect  into  the  other  man’s  mind  new  facades 
of  interest  in  regard  to  the  commonest  things 
you  handle. 

Now  writers  of  good  letters  have,  like  my¬ 
self,  and  with  probably  better  success  than 
myself,  attempted  to  formulate  rules  of  con¬ 
struction  by  the  use  of  which  a  letter  would 
“pull.” 

These  rules  are  excellent  in  their  place  and 
I  will  certainly  give  them  for  the  benefit  of  the 
readers  of  this  brochure,  but  at  best  they  are 
an  aid  only  to  good  letter  writing,  just  as  the 
carpenter’s  rule  is  an  aid  only  to  good  con¬ 
struction.  A  poor  carpenter  could  not  proceed 
without  a  rule,  but  a  good  one  could;  he  would 
probably  make  a  rule.  In  other  words  good 
letter  writing  is  dependent  in  the  last  analysis 
on  principles ,  knowledge,  experience  and  imagi¬ 
nation. 


16 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Those  writers  who  have  attempted  to  formulate 
rules  of  letter  writing  insist  for  one  thing  on  the 
importance  of  a  good  opening  paragraph  to 
gain  the  requisite  ATTENTION.  This  has  its 
place,  and  its  important  place.  Speaking  per¬ 
sonally,  however,  I  may  say  the  spirit  beneath 
the  letter  is  the  thing  that  always  attracts  me. 
Perhaps  I  will  be  better  understood  if  I  say  the 
spirit  beneath  the  letters — or  words.  The  written 
word  is  simply  the  crystallization  of  some  man’s 
thought  and  we  place  that  mentality  in  the  good, 
bad  or  indifferent  class  by  what  I  may  term  the 
look  of  the  letter — though  it  is  something  else 
beside  that. 

For  instance:  a  letter  reaches  me  in  the  mail, 
or  I  pick  up  The  Saturday  Evening  Post  and 
glance  at  an  article.  In  reality  my  eyes  during 
that  brief  glance  flash  a  hundred  impressions  to 
my  brain.  I  take  in  the  page  in  a  hundred 
“spots”  representing  words  that  stud  the  page — 
like  flashing  jewels,  dulled  glass,  or  daubs  of 
clay.  My  brain  is  instantly  caught  by  the 
radiance  of  words  or  repelled  by  their  lack  of  it. 
Great  writers  intuitively  have  grasped  what  is 
really  the  gripping  power  in  a  letter,  article, 
essay  or  book.  I  can  do  no  better  than  quote 
to  exemplify  my  argument, — 

“Words  that  speak  and  words  that  weep .” — Cowley . 

“There  are  words  that  cut  like  steel. ” — Balzac . 

“The  artillery  of  words.” — Swift . 

“ Razors  to  my  wounded  heart.” — Shakespeare . 

“Words  are  but  pictures  of  our  thought.” — Bryden . 

“Some  syllables  are  swords .” — Henry  Vaughan . 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


17 


Do  you  see  what  is  meant?  A  letter  may  be 
a  model  of  construction ;  perfect  in  rule  and  rote, 
but  it  will  neither  speak,  weep,  cut  nor  picture 
unless,  back  of  it ,  expressing  itself  in  letters, 
words  and  syllables  on  the  page  before  you,  is 
a  mind  of  originality,  power  and  force. 

And, — 

The  first  thing  talent  does  in  writing  is  to 
forget  rules  and  methods  and  pour  out  its  mes¬ 
sage  in  living,  burning  words  from  the  heart 
and  from  the  brain. 

Yet,  as  the  student  must  master  the  techni¬ 
que  of  the  piano,  so  the  man  wishing  to  learn 
to  write  must,  first  at  least,  lean  on  the  rules  of 
grammar,  punctuation,  construction — just  in 
proportion  to  his  genius  for  the  work  will  he 
finally  pass,  outstrip  and  discard  those  rules 
and  work  to  the  individuality  and  power  within 
him  that  takes  him  unquestionably  and  unerr¬ 
ingly  to  RESULTS. 

Turn  your  mind  on  your  business — look  at 
it,  study  it  long  enough  and  you  will  realize 
that  everything  on  earth  has  some  relation  to 
it  and  you  to  it.  When  the  glow  comes  expres¬ 
sion  will  follow — if  you  have  it.  If  not,  the  fire 
of  enthusiasm  you  feel  can  be  translated  sympa¬ 
thetically  by  men  who  intuitively  feel  and  can 
express  what  you  desire  to  express. 

That  is  the  lesson  this  chapter  teaches — the 
springs  of  success  are  within  yourself.  Begin 
with  that  thought.  All  else  will  follow.  Begin 
today. 


CHAPTER  THREE 


“The  post  is  the  grand  connecting  link  of  all  transactions ,  of  all 
negotiations '' — Voltaire. 

IN  business  there  are  three  chief  kinds  of 
letters  which  technically  are  designated — 

(1)  “Inquiry-Bringers”  or  “Canvassing 
Letters.” 

(2)  “Answering”  or  “Sales  Letters.” 

(3)  “Follow-Up”  Letters. 

A  man  manufacturers  some  article  that  has 
a  limited  appeal.  Generally  he  knows  that  say 
one  out  of  a  group  of  a  hundred  people  will  be 
interested  in  what  he  has.  What  he  has  is 
sufficiently  complex  and  sufficiently  costly  to 
be  described  in  a  rather  expensive  booklet.  If 
he  has  to  virtually  throw  a  hundred  booklets 
away  to  reach  one  buyer  his  campaign  is  going 
to  be  expensive.  To  avoid  this  he  keeps  the 
expensive  booklets  on  his  shelves  and  sends  out 
a  letter  either  giving  a  brief  epitome  of  what 
the  booklet  contains,  or  giving  a  brief  sum¬ 
marization  of  the  goods,  offering  to  send  exhaus¬ 
tive  details  on  request. 

The  request  sorts  out  the  one  out  of  the 
hundred  who  is  interested.  The  expensive 
booklet  goes  to  this  name  and,  possibly,  an 
expensive  “Follow  up.”  Perhaps,  in  the  course 
of  years  a  good  deal  of  money  will  be  spent  on 
that  “prospect”  and  thousands  like  him  who 
answered  the  first  “Canvassing”  or  “Inquiry- 


20 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Bringing”  letter,  so  the  utility  of  the  letter 
ought  to  be  apparent  enough.  It  has  prevented 
waste. 

This  “Canvassing”  or  “Inquiry-Bringing” 
letter  has  also  done  something  else;  it  has 
insured  an  attentive  audience.  People  in  this 
world  are  apt  to  dodge  what  you  throw  at  them 
and  catch  what  they  ask  you  to  throw.  This  is 
a  very  important  psychological  principle  to 
recognize  and  act  upon  in  all  mail  order  work. 
The  idea  in  business  is  not  to  send  a  booklet 
to  an  uninterested  man  (he  won’t  read  it)  but 
to  an  interested  man;  he  will  read  it.  We  have 
absolutely  no  chance  of  converting  a  buyer  who 
will  not  read  what  we  write, but  a  most  excellent 
chance  of  converting  the  man  who  will  read  the 
message  intended  for  him. 

Nearly  all  the  great  advertisers  proceed  on 
this  principle.  They  do  not  send  out  their 
booklets  indiscriminately  to  the  population  of 
America,  but  advertise  their  business  or  their 
booklets  describing  it,  and  form  their  mailing 
list  of  people  who  have  evinced  interest  by 
inquiring.  The  man  selling  a  fairly  expensive 
article  or  service  is  foolish  to  waste  his  printed 
matter  and  energies  by  following  a  different 
method — hence  the  “Inquiry-Bringer” — a  letter 
fulfilling,  in  the  mails,  what  the  advertisement 
does  in  newspapers  and  magazines. 

“answering”  or  “sales  letters.” 

The  “Answering”  or  “Sales  Letter,”  as  its 
name  indicates,  answers  the  interested  inquiry 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


21 


(ordinarily  a  booklet  goes  with  it).  It  may  do 
one  of  two  things:  it  may  heighten  interest  in 
the  booklet  accompanying  it  (thus  mak¬ 
ing  doubly  sure  the  question  of  perusal)  or 
it  may,  in  conjunction  with  the  booklet,  drive 
direct  for  the  sale,  endeavoring  to  clinch  down 
the  order  and  get  the  money  there  and  then. 
The  phraseology  and  policy  of  this  letter  may 
vary  to  the  above  extent,  according  to  circum¬ 
stances. 

"follow-up”  letters. 

Follow-Up  letters  deal  with  two  classes  of 
people  in  the  main:  First,  the  obdurates ,  who 
have  failed  to  respond  to  the  first  sales  letter 
and  booklet;  and,  second,  those  delayed  in  their 
response  by  want  of  the  necessary  money. 
Betwixt  and  between  these  lie  those  who  were 
sold  but  were  negligent  in  buying,  and  those  who 
were  partly  sold,  but  not  sufficiently  to  order. 

It  is  the  work  of  the  follow-up  to — 

(1)  Find  new  arguments  to  win  the  orders 
from  the  obdurates. 

(2)  To  keep  those  who  intend  to  order  con¬ 
tinuously  reminded  so  that  when  they  can  order 
they  will. 

(3)  To  “ripen”  the  half-ripened  “prospect,” 
deepening  and  strengthening  the  original  im¬ 
pression  created  till  they  are  worked  up  to  the 
buying  point. 

Understanding  now  the  three  most  important 
types  of  letters  we  will  be  better  enabled  to 


22 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


construct  one  or  more  of  its  peculiar  kind,  in 
the  most  effective  way,  which  means  that  we 
will  not  try  to  sell  with  an  “Inquiry-Bringer” 
or  procure  an  inquiry  from  a  “Sales  Letter” 
except  to  the  extent  special  conditions  indicate. 

A  RULE  FOR  BUSINESS  LETTER  WRITING 

As  a  general  rule  an  article  fairly  high  in 
price  cannot  be  sold  through  a  single  letter; 
this  means  any  price  from  31  up. 

A  low  priced  article,  ranging  from  a  dime  to  a 
dollar,  may  be  sold  on  a  single  letter. 

To  both  these  rules  there  are  exceptions. 

The  elements  of  the  sale  require  that — 

The  “prospect’s”  ATTENTION  be  gained. 

That  his  I NTEREST  be  aroused  and  held  till, 

We  find  his  DESIRE  burning  strongly  to 
possess,  at  which  time  we  STIMULATE  HIM 
TO  ACTION. 

The  “Sale,”  it  will  be  seen,  therefore,  com¬ 
prises  four  steps  or  stages  of  mentality  through 
which  we  must  bring  the  “prospect.”  We  must, 
before  we  make  the  sale,  accomplish  the  feat  of 
making  him  think  in  four  consecutive  directions 
at  certain  periods  of  the  sale,  and  as  the  sale 
progresses.  If,  like  the  chameleon,  his  colors 
changed  as  his  emotions  changed  we  could 
imagine  such  a  prospect  passing  successively 
through  shades  of  White  and  Red  and  Blue  and 
Gold,  in  precise  proportion  to  the  extent  of  our 
success  in  passing  him  through  the  four  stages 
of  “The  Sale.” 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


23 


FINDING  THE  MARKET. 

Now  the  first  step  in  selling  is  to  find  a 
“Possibility.”  We  do  not  want  to  deal  with 
“Impossibilities.”  If  I  was  in  New  York  City 
with  a  horse  for  sale  I  would  endeavor  to  find 
men  who  had  horses,  or  bought  horses,  or  who 
liked  horses,  and  who,  generally,  were  in  a 
position  to  house  the  horse  I  had. 

A  man  must  approximate  his  market  place 
before  he  can  market  what  he  has;  he  would  be 
foolish  to  attempt  to  sell  furs  to  ladies  in  the 
tropics  or  Palm  Beach  clothing  and  underwear 
to  exploring  parties  bound  for  the  frozen  wastes 
of  the  north. 

Well,  I  am  in  New  York  City  with  my  horse 
— thoroughbred,  we  will  say,  valued  at  some 
thousands  of  dollars.  I  either  find  my  “possi¬ 
bilities”  with  a  “Canvassing”  letter,  or  reach 
them  through  the  “Horses  and  Carriages  for 
Sale”  of  the  New  York  Herald. 

Keeping  consideration  to  letters,  suppose  I 
went  and  bought  a  list  of  horse  owners  from  a 
list  broker.  Those  names,  if  accurate,  would 
be  my  “possibilities.”  I  send  out  my  “Can¬ 
vassing”  or  “Inquiry-Bringing”  letter  describing 
my  horse  in  brief,  succinct  terms,  and  offer  to 
furnish  full  information  to  those  interested . 
Those  interested  reply.  These  replies  are  now 
my  “ prospects .”  Those  who  have  not  replied 
do  not  interest  me  any  more  because,  mani¬ 
festly,  they  are  not  interested  in  me,  or  in  what 
I  have. 


24 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Now,  my  horse  is  worth  say  35,000  and  I 
have  to  get  that  for  him.  If  I  do  I  make  a 
handsome  profit.  Possibly  I  have  other  horses 
to  sell,  “Back  on  the  ranch.”  Remember,  The 
Written  Word  has  to  make  the  sale,  or  bear 
nearly  its  full  burden. 

Now,  the  average  letter,  typewritten  and 
single  spaced,  contains  about  three  hundred 
words.  When  I  tell  you  that  a  single  letter 
should  not  be  relied  upon  to  make  the  sale 
of  an  expensive  article  you  will  begin  to  see 
why.  Would  you  attempt  to  make  35,000 
sales  in  three  hundred  words ?  Instinctively  you 
would  feel  you  could  not  do  that.  If  you  were 
a  professional  business  writer  your  instinct, 
transmuted  to  knowledge,  would  tell  you  that 
was  not  possible,  because  to  make  a  sale  you 
must  pass  through  the  four  stages  of  Attention, 
Interest ,  Desire ,  and  Action ,  and  you  know  three 
hundred  words  is  woefully  insufficient  for  that 
purpose — you  know  just  as  certainly  as  the 
naval  architect  knows  that  he  cannot  build  a 
hundred  foot  vessel  in  a  fifty  foot  building. 
There  are  limitations  that  bind  us  mentally  just 
as  they  do  physically ,  and  the  art  of  mental 
achievement  is  to  know  what  time  and  space 
we  must  have  to  achieve  a  certain  fixed  purpose. 

Do  not  confuse  the  issue  in  this  case.  I 
could  of  course  so  describe  the  horse  that  an 
interview  would  be  requested,  and,  at  that 
interview  I  could  so  demonstrate  that  horse 
that  a  sale  would  be  effected.  In  that  case  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


25 


letters  have  helped  towards  a  sale  but  not  made 
the  sale  itself.  The  interview  and  demonstra¬ 
tion  did  that.  Letters  are  frequently  used  just 
this  way,  and  this  is  one  of  the  most  effective 
ways  in  which  letters  can  be  used — to  arouse 
sufficient  interest  to  insure  a  call,  or  to  be 
requested  to  call,  replying  on  subsequent  con¬ 
versation  and  demonstration  to  make  a  sale. 

I  am  assuming,  however,  that  the  sale  of  this 
horse  has  to  be  made  without  me  and  the 
buyer  meeting — that  title  passes  eventually 
through  The  Written  Word. 

Keeping  these  factors  in  mind  you  will  find 
that  while  the  “Inquiry-Bringing”  letter  can  be 
short  (say  one  page)  the  “Sales  Letter”  must 
be  relatively  long  (say  twenty  pages) — please 
don’t  gasp,  this  isn’t  as  bad  as  it  looks  when  we 
come  to  methods !* 

So  far,  then,  we  have  got  a  list  of  “possi¬ 
bilities”  made  up  of,  say,  10,000  names.  We 
have  canvassed  these  “Possibilities”  with  an 
“Inquiry-Bringing”  letter  and  got,  say,  ten 
per  cent  replies,  making  a  list  of  one  thousand 
“Prospects.”  Assuming  we  have  a  string  of 
horses  perpetually  for  sale,  “Back  on  the 
ranch,”  we  then  have  to  see  how  many  of  these 
one  thousand  prospects  we  can  eventually  make 
customers  and  buyers. 

In  the  process  we  will  use  an  “Inquiry- 
Bringer”  or  “Canvassing”  letter  (or  a  series  of 
them),  a  “Sales  Letter”  (aided  probably  by  a 
booklet)  and  a  “Follow  Up,”  comprising  a 

*See  concluding  paragraphs  on  last  page. 


26 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


series  of  letters  mailed  say  ten  days  apart  till 
exhausted.  These  are  the  Tools  through  which 
we  make  the  Sales.  I  sincerely  hope  that  before 
we  get  through  we  will  be  first-class  workmen, 
able  to  do  creditable  jobs  of  mental  carpenter¬ 
ing.  We  will,  I  hope,  get  to  actual  constructiony 
with  all  its  rules  for  architecture,  with  examples 
to  follow,  in  our  next. 


CHAPTER  FOUR 


"Syllables  govern  the  World." — John  Selden. 


I  HAVE  shown  that  there  are  three  chief 
kinds  of  letters  used  in  business,  i.  e., 
“Inquiry-Bringers”  or  “Canvassing”  let¬ 
ters,  “Answering”  or  “Sales”  letters,  and  “Fol¬ 
low-Up”  letters. 

It  may  be  said  that  a  correct  mail-order  plan 
follows  the  rule  indicated  by  the  sequence  of 
the  letters;  first,  it  gets  the  INQUIRY  (by  the 
“Inquiry-bringer”),  then  it  attempts  the  direct 
sale  (by  the  sales  letter)  and,  if  that  attempt  is 
not  immediately  successful,  it  “Follows-up”  by 
the  “Follow-Up”  Letter. 

To  be  logical,  therefore,  we  should  treat  the 
various  groups  of  letters  in  their  right  order,  and 
this  of  course  brings  us  to  a  consideration  of 
the  “Inquiry-Bringer.” 

Inquiries  are  the  seed  from  which  spring 
sales.  A  good  inquiry-bringing  letter  can  easily 
double  or  treble  the  volume  of  sales  by  bringing 
in  double  or  treble  the  past  ratio  of  inquiries. 
As  we  proceed  we  will  see  that  ALL  well  written 
letters  (Inquiry-Bringers,  Sales  and  Follow- 
Ups)  are  governed  by  one  set  of  principles  in 
their  construction.  They  must  each  arouse 
Attention,  create  Interest,  stimulate  Desire,  and 
bring  about  Action. 

To  my  mind  a  good  letter,  accomplishing 
the  purpose  for  which  it  is  intended,  compares 


28 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


in  principle  exactly  with  the  principle  of  the 
wedge,  and  this  may  be  illustrated  as  follows, 
the  wedge  being  the  letter  itself,  and  the  divi¬ 
sions  different  parts  of  that  letter. 

The  opening  paragraph  is  the  sharp  end  of 
the  wedge,  representing  the  Attention  section; 
as  perusal  proceeds  Attention 
deepens  to  Interest,  then  to 
Desire,  and  finally,  around  the 
last  paragraph,  to  Action. 

Let  us  take  a  typical  “Inquiry- 
Bringer”  and  see  if  we  can  ob¬ 
serve  these  principles  working  out 
in  mathematical  sequence — the  fol¬ 
lowing  letter  brought  forty  per  cent, 
inquiries  on  an  investment  proposi¬ 
tion — an  extraordinarily  high  per¬ 
centage  in  a  field  where  the  average 
“Inquiry-Bringer”  secures  about  2  to 
6  per  cent,  only  of  inquiries. 

Observe  how  closely  the  letter  follows 
mentally  the  “wedge”  principle  that  we 
illustrate  physically.  This  is  one  secret  of 
its  success. 

If  the  letter  is  carefully  studied  another  secret 
for  its  success  will  disclose  itself,  constituting  a 
second  and  very  effective  principle  to  use  in 
“Inquiry-Getting”  letters,  provided  it  is  not 
carried  too  far. 

I  consider  this  second  principle  of  great 
importance  and  I  want  you,  Reader,  to  find  it 
yourself ,  out  of  the  letter,  if  you  can. 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


29 


Apart  from  the  construction  and  wording  of 
this  letter,  what  made  it  “pull”  the  inquiries  as 
it  did?  What  factor  in  human  nature  was 
played  on  so  that  readers  fairly  “itched”  to 
answer  it?  The  factor  worked  upon  can  be 
expressed  in  one  word — what  is  that  word? 
If,  after  reading  the  letter,  you  feel  as  if  you 
would  like  to  answer  it  and  get  the  reply,  ask 
yourself  why.  Ask  yourself  what  urge  the 
letter  contains  to  make  you  feel  that  way.  If 
you  come  at  the  matter  this  way  it  is  safe  to 
say  I  will  have  succeeded  in  getting  a  principle 
of  successful  letter  writing  into  your  mind  that 
you  will  never  forget,  but,  on  the  contrary,  will 
use  to  your  profit  year  after  year. 

Our  next  chapter  will  tell  you  the  second 
factor  that  made  the  letter  pull.  Try  and 
anticipate  that  information  so  that  you  may 
compare  notes. 

Dear  Sir: — 

Men  made  iron  and  steel  for  many  years,  yet  it 
remained  to  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth  century 
to  revolutionize  the  industry  and  to  give  growth  and 
multiplication  to  “A  thousand  millionaires. ** 
Attention  Men  “In  steer*  while  this  magic  change  was  in 
Section  progress,  made  fortunes,  literally  “in  a  night”;  its 
history  has  proven  a  romance  of  industry. 

And  it  is  about  to  be  duplicated — not  in  steel,  but 
in  another  industry  that  stands  in  the  same  position 
that  steel  stood  halj  a  century  ago. 

Interest  It  is  ripe  for  revolution — and  revolution  is  upon 

Section  it — it  also  will  make  “A  thousand  millionaires/* 

Today  it  presents  one  of  the  most  promising 
openings  for  capital — large  or  small — it  is  possible 
to  conceive. 

The  conditions  governing  it  are — extraordinary — 
unique — its  promise  is  spectacular — it  will  not  alone 
duplicate,  but  exceed  the  marvelous  record  of  steel. 


30  THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 

Sextthw  May  we  te^  you  more  about  it- 

You  can  share  with  us  in  the  rewards  just  ahead. 
Action  We  have  prepared  a  brochure  for  limited  distri- 

Section  bution  among  men  we  believe  will  be  interested  in 
the  FACTS;  it  is  expensive,  and  we  do  not  wish  to 
mail  it  to  you  without  the  assurance  that  it  will  be 
at  least  READ.  If  you  would  like  to  read  it,  and  will 
make  request  on  enclosed  postal,  this  brochure  will 
be  mailed  to  you  entirely  without  expense  or  obligation . 
May  we  send  it? 

Very  truly  yours. 

It  will  be  perceived  that  the  object  of  this 
letter  was  not  to  make  a  sale  but  to  produce  an 
inquiry.  In  producing  an  inquiry  that  ulti¬ 
mately  turned  to  a  sale  the  letter  became  of 
course  part  of  the  sales  campaign,  and  of  course 
the  ultimate  sale  was  its  final  objective.  The 
important  thing  to  grasp  here  is  that  the  act 
of  selling  to  a  man  buying  is  arrived  at  by  a 
series  of  steps  not  usually  apparent  to  the 
buyer,  and  sometimes  not  even  apparent  to 
the  seller.  Many  salesmen  are  splendid  result- 
producers  yet  cannot  tell  exactly  how  they 
make  their  sales.  If  their  methods  are  examined, 
however,  it  will  be  seen  that  they  all,  by  differ¬ 
ent  ways,  methods,  manners  and  ideas,  pass 
the  “prospect”  through  the  stages  of  Attention, 
Interest,  Desire  and  Action,  “Closing”  when,  in 
their  judgment,  they  have  the  man  before  them 
at  the  final  stage. 

The  reader  may  be  interested  with  a  bit  of 
history  connected  with  this  letter  and  the 
material  that  followed  it.  The  man  that 
ordered  it  had  a  big  idea,  but  nothing  in  the  way 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


31 


of  assets;  he  had,  in  fact,  hardly  sufficient  capital 
to  pay  for  the  material  he  ordered.  The  letter, 
as  previously  stated,  proved  remarkably  suc¬ 
cessful  in  bringing  in  the  inquiries  from  the 
right  class  of  people  (carefully  selected  in 
advance.) 

The  writer  received  a  letter  from  him  some 
time  later  containing  the  following  extracts: 

“I  am  writing  this  letter  to  you  personally  as  I  desire  at  this 
time  some  advice  as  to  my  future  plans.  *  *  *  I  want  to  say  I 
have  succeeded  in  placing  practically  all  the  issue  of  bonds  at  par. 

This  will  enable  the -  factory  to  fully  carry  out  their  plans  to 

install  their  plant  and  will  also  enable  the  writer  to  retain  98  per 
cent,  of  all  the  stock. 

*  *  *  *  I  found  it  an  advantage  to  have  more  than  one  kind 
of  bond  to  handle.  I  saw  an  opportunity  to  purchase  a  telephone 
company  at  much  less  than  the  actual  value  of  the  plant.  I  pur¬ 
chased  this  with  a  cash  expenditure  of  a  few  thousand  dollars,  bond¬ 
ing  it  for  enough  to  completely  pay  for  the  company,  sold  the  bonds 
above  par  so  as  to  net  the  telephone  company  par,  and  now  own 
the  telephone  company  clear,  all  out  of  debt,  and  have  310,000 
cash  for  the  extensions — this  all  secured  by  means  of  the  bonds 
issued  on  the  telephone  plant.” 

Thus  this  man,  with  but  a  few  hundred  dollars 
capital  (sufficient  to  pay  for  the  presentation 
literature),  found  himself  almost  over  night 
made  wealthy  and  independent  through  the 
power  of  a  few  letters  and  a  booklet!  The 
original  success  turned  his  head;  he  went  into 
promotion  work  on  a  diversified  scale,  cutting 
himself  off  from  information  or  advice,  and 
achieved,  on  the  reputation  of  his  original  suc¬ 
cess,  other  successes  which  turned  to  failure 
through  rank  inexperience,  and  he  died,  eventu¬ 
ally,  a  disappointed,  broken  man  in  an  obscure 
mining  camp — not  the  first  time  by  any  means 


32 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


that  I  have  seen  a  man  go  down  to  ruin  through 
a  success  achieved  too  easily  and  too  suddenly 
by  a  series  of  well  planned  letters  and  booklets. 

In  the  next  chapter  we  will  make  reference 
to  this  letter  again  and  you  will  probably  be 
interested  in  studying  it  anew  in  the  light  of 
information  and  knowledge  yet  to  come. 


CHAPTER  FIVE 


Curiosity  is  lying  in  wait  for  every  secret . — Emerson. 

Curiosity  is  as  much  the  parent  of  attention  as  attention  is  of  memory . 

— Whately. 

The  first  and  simplest  emotion  which  we  discover  in  the  human  mind 
is  curiosity . — Burke. 

IN  the  last  chapter  I  introduced  a  typical 
“Inquiry-Bringer”  and  illustrated  the  phys¬ 
ical,  psychical  and  mechanical  principles 
(order  and  sequence  of  ideas)  through  which  it 
was  made  productive  (for,  be  it  remembered, 
this  letter  went  through  the  fire  of  experience 
and  trial  and  proved  extraordinarily  productive). 

We  find  such  a  letter  is  a  mental  wedge — that 
it  plays  on  the  mind  of  the  “prospect”,  putting 
him  alternately  into  mental  conditions  of  Atten¬ 
tion,  Interest,  Desire  and  Action — these  are 
the  principles  and  motives  that  move  him  to 
Act  on  receiving  and  reading  that  letter. 

I  stated  there  was  another  motive  in  which 
the  four  named  were  bathed,  as  it  were,  and 
asked  my  readers  to  express  that  motive  by  a 
single  word — that  word  is — curiosity. 

Read  the  letter  again  and  you  will  see  it  lacks 
a  positive  subject — we  explain  the  properties  of 
a  thing  without  saying  what  the  thing  itself  is. 
In  a  sense  the  letter  is  an  interesting  conum- 
drum  that  it  is  to  the  interest  (through  the 
Desire  section)  of  the  reader  to  have  solved. 
His  only  method  of  getting  the  answer  is  to 
write — hence  45  per  cent  did  write. 


34 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Curiosity  is  a  two-edged  sword;  like  all  other 
forces  it  must  be  used  with  great  care  and  dis¬ 
crimination;  in  its  place,  under  right  conditions, 
it  is  exceedingly  effective.  In  this  case  the 
letter  did  not  seek  to  provoke  the  curiosity  of 
everyone  indiscriminately;  on  the  contrary,  it 
was  mailed  to  a  carefully  selected  list  of  names 
from  everyone  of  which  it  was  most  desirable 
to  receive  the  reply  that  indicated  the  necessary 
attention. 

The  letter  in  reply  deepened  attention  to 
interest  and  conviction  and  the  order  was  landed 
because  we  had  taken  care  that  when  we  had  a 
convinced  man  we  also  had  a  man  of  sufficient 
means  to  put  up  the  sum  asked  from  him. 

Working  on  picked  lists  of  names  the  principle 
of  CURIOSITY  can  be  legitimately  and  effec¬ 
tively  employed  as  the  first  step  in  mail  sales¬ 
manship.  The  same  principle  might  be  disas¬ 
trous  if  employed  indiscriminately  on  a  news¬ 
paper  or  magazine  advertising  campaign,  flood¬ 
ing,  as  it  would  do,  the  sponsor  with  a  mass  of 
undesirable  inquiries. 


The  principles  of  Attention,  Interest,  Desire 
and  Action  have  been  pretty  well  expounded 
by  others  in  the  past,  though  I  hope  to  have 
something  new  to  say  about  them  before  I  have 
finished,  but  the  principle  of  CURIOSITY  has 
not  been  explained  as  it  should,  because,  per¬ 
haps,  it  has  not  been  perceived  in  its  true 
relationship  as  “The  parent  of  Attention.” 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


35 


If  space  permitted  I  could  here  stop  and 
write  chapter  after  chapter  rich  with  citation 
and  example  on  this  CURIOSITY  theme  alone 
and  I  could  tell  some  extraordinary  instances  of 
prolific  results  accruing  from  it  when  judiciously 
and  intelligently  used.  Space  is  strictly  limited, 
however. 

A  few  illustrations  may  be  permitted;  take 
gold — it  is  an  extraordinary  metal — a  paradox. 
In  times  of  panic  when  all  other  values  fall  its 
value  rises.  The  world  has  never  had  enough 
of  it,  and  cannot  get  enough  of  it;  it  is  free  from 
competition;  patents  and  inventions  cannot  hurt 
it,  monopolies  cannot  “corner”  it,  and  it  is 
good  throughout  the  world,  in  any  shape  or 
form,  provided  it  is  pure,  for  things  that  no 
other  things  could  exchange  for. 

Take  “Gold”  out  of  that  sentence  and  you 
have  a  “Conundrum”  letter  that,  linked  with 
a  gold  mine,  makes  it  look  distinctly  to  the 
reader’s  interest  to  solve  by  replying  and  read¬ 
ing  the  answer  to  his  reply. 

If  that  reader  was  a  known  buyer  of  gold 
mines,  or  of  mining  shares,  you  have  gripped  his 
attention  by  a  method  that  is  not  ordinarily 
followed,  and,  provided  skill  and  ability  is  used 
after  that  stage,  results  must  be  in  exact  pro¬ 
portion. 


We  pick  up  a  letter  physically  and  mechan¬ 
ically  right — it  is  shaped  like  a  wedge  and  we 


36 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


can  trace  (as  per  example  given)  the  various 
steps  from  Attention  to  Action. 

This,  according  to  the  critics,  might  constitute 
an  exceedingly  good  letter;  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
it  might  be  an  exceedingly  bad  letter;  it  is  one 
thing  to  mix  a  dish  up  from  the  proportions 
given  in  a  cook  book,  but  quite  another  thing 
to  bring  out  of  the  pot  or  oven  the  thing  of 
flavor  and  savor  it  was  designed  to  be. 

Various  writers  on  the  subject  of  letter  writ¬ 
ing  have  (and  rightfully)  placed  great  stress 
on  the  opening  paragraph.  My  own  method, 
in  determining  whether  I  consider  a  piece  of 
printed  matter  worthy  of  the  time  necessary  to 
take  for  perusal,  is  to  “sample”  it,  quickly  and 
thoroughly,  in  a  score  of  places.  The  man  who 
had  an  ingenious  “Opening  paragraph”  would  get 
my  attention  for  a  second  of  time  and  lose  it  a 
few  seconds  after  did  not  my  test  reveal  a  con¬ 
tinuous  thread  of  cleverness  and  thought 
throughout  what  he  had  written. 

I  arrive  at  decision,  I  have  found,  by  what  I 
may  term  “stabbing”  the  manuscript  or  letter 
with  my  eyes;  in  other  words  I  pick  out,  with 
lightning-like  rapidity,  bits  of  the  Mss.  “five 
words  long”  that  literally  “bleed”  (or  otherwise) 
with  thought  as  I  pounce. 

I  do  this  consciously — the  average  man  does 
it  unconsciously;  if  the  words  are  mediocre, 
drab  and  dead,  down  goes  the  Mss. — down  and 
out  so  far  as  I  am  concerned.  If,  on  the  other 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


37 


hand,  I  find  something  approximating  Tenny¬ 
son’s  specifications, 

“ Jewels  five-words-long 
That  on  the  stretch'd  forefinger  of  all  Time 
Sparkle  forever 

Then  I  am  interested — then  that  Mss.  goes 
either  into  my  pocket  for  leisurely  perusal,  or 
into  an  arm  chair  with  me  for  instant  reading. 
The  information  of  a  letter  is  one  of  its  points 
of  contact  with  the  human  mind,  but  its  suc¬ 
cess  lies, — not  with  its  information,  nor  with 
its  opening  nor  closing  paragraph,  but  in  the 
sustained  skill  and  thought  throughout  it,  on 
the  page,  in  the  paragraphs,  in  the  sentences,  and 
sections  of  sentences  “five  words  long.” 

This  fact  explains  why  what  seems  to  be  an 
extraordinarily  bad  letter  from  the  standpoint 
of  the  “Experts”  will  still  produce  extraordi¬ 
nary  results.  It  is  a  fact  that  the  writer  of  a 
letter,  intensely  in  earnest,  will  violate  all  rules 
of  construction  and  have  his  presentation  topsy 
turvy,  and  it  is  also  a  fact  that  the  reader , 
gripped  by  that  earnestness,  will  mentally  re¬ 
construct  the  letter  and  give  it  its  right  setting 
and  sequence.  That  both  parties  act  subcon¬ 
sciously  and  without  conscious  knowledge  of 
what  they  are  doing  mentally  in  no  wise  alters 
the  fact  that  it  is  done. 


In  the  light  of  all  this  we  may  draw  a  few 
helpful  conclusions  I  think,  the  first  being  that 
no  man  in  whom  earnestness  and  enthusiasm 


38 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


burns  need  despair  of  being  a  good  letter  writer 
simply  because  he  lacks  a  knowledge  of  the 
technique  of  the  art,  and  I  think  we  may  as 
fairly  conclude  that  if  we  can  take  this  earnest, 
enthusiastic  man  and  give  him  a  knowledge  of 
the  technique  of  the  art  his  results  will  triple 
or  quadruple. 

Now  what,  in  the  last  analysis,  makes  for 
earnestness  and  enthusiasm?  Simply  the  con¬ 
sciousness  of  being  enabled  to  render  a  fellow¬ 
being  service.  The  man  with  a  thing  that  saves 
the  world  time,  or  labor,  or  money,  is  a  man 
working  a  great  economic  benefit — he  can  teach 
us  do  things  better,  cheaper,  faster. 

Bring  this  man  opposite  another  man — a 
cynic  if  you  please,  and  watch  him  warm  up 
and  tell  and  demonstrate  what  he  has  till  he 
has  the  other  fellow  convinced  in  spite  of  Hell. 
Why?  Because  a  living,  breathing  man  is  be¬ 
fore  him  into  whose  face  and  eyes  he  can  look 
and  watch  and  be  stimulated  by  the  effect  of 
his  words  as  mirrored  in  the  other’s  countenance. 

Take  our  service  man  away  and  place  him 
opposite  a  typewriter,  a  blank  sheet  of  writing 
paper,  carbon  paper,  and  an  envelope,  and  watch 
what  happens;  his  eyes  see  material  where  before 
they  saw  spiritual  things;  he  is  no  longer  faced 
with  flesh  and  blood  and  heart  and  brain  and 
soul  and  spirit  but  with  cold,  immobile  dead 
things — he  is  demagnetized. 

Yet,  through  and  by  these  things  he  must 
achieve  the  miracle  of  personality — he  must 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


39 


learn  to  sway  a  thousand  or  a  hundred  thousand 
minds  precisely  as  he  swayed  that  one — this 
he  must  do  if  he  has  to  spread  his  message 
broadcast  by  means  of  the  mails — this  he  must 
do  if  he  wants  to  achieve  in  a  year  what  would 
represent  a  century  of  time  under  other  con¬ 
ditions — this  he  must  do,  and  can  do,  if  within 
himself  he  has  that  rare,  fine,  ethereal  quality 
termed  IMAGINATION  that,— 

“ Gathers  up 

The  undiscovered  Universe , 

Like  jewels  in  a  jasper  cup.” 

We  will,  in  our  next,  take  up  this  great  sub¬ 
ject  in  the  hope  that  we  may  find  new  and  useful 
things  that  will  assist  us  in  the  art  of  resultful 
letter  writing. 


CHAPTER  SIX 


Imagination  is  the  eye  of  the  soul. — Joubert. 

The  soul  without  imagination  is  what  an  observatory  would  be  without 
a  telescope. — Beecher. 

IMAGINATION  has  two  qualities — it 
enables  us  to  see  the  thing  we  think  of, 
and  it  enables  us  to  endow  the  things  we 
see  through  our  material  eyes  with  qualities 
that  others  may  not  see;  the  latter  faculty  may 
perhaps  be  classed  as  the  finer  form  of  imagi¬ 
nation  termed  Fancy  and  we  find  it  predomi¬ 
nating  in  poetic  imagery.  In  the  words  of 
Fuller,  “Most  marvelous  and  enviable  is  that 
fecundity  of  fancy  which  can  adorn  whatever 
it  touches,  which  can  invest  naked  fact  and  dry 
reasoning  with  unlooked-for  beauty,  make 
flowerets  bloom  even  on  the  brow  of  the  preci¬ 
pice,  and  when  nothing  better  can  be  had,  can 
turn  the  very  substance  of  rock  itself  into  moss 
and  lichens.  This  faculty  is  incomparably  the 
most  important  for  the  vivid  and  attractive 
exhibition  of  truth  to  the  minds  of  men.” 

It  may  seem  a  strange  assertion  that  the 
faculty  of  the  poet  should  have  a  use — a  vital- 
constructive  use — in  prosiac  business,  but  it 
certainly  has.  A  gasoline  engine,  for  instance, 
to  the  manufacturer  is  apt  to  be  but  a  thing  of 
iron  and  steel  and  brass  and  babbitt,  wrought 
out  by  mechanical  processes  in  a  noisy,  smoky 
factory  at  the  cost  of  so  much  tabulated  time 
and  labor  and  money. 


42 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


A  yachtsman  may  look  at  that  engine  in  an 
entirely  different  light;  he  conceives  it  wrought 
under  Thor-like  hammers  into  a  thing  of  grace, 
and  beauty  and  strength.  To  him  it  becomes 
something  almost  sentient — a  faithful  friend. , 
that,  when  howling  gale  and  breaking  seas 
threaten  his  destruction,  hums  cheerily  beneath 
his  feet  a  symphony  that  breathes  of  rugged 
virility  and  power  and  dependability — he  feels 
the  throbbing,  pulsing,  vibrant  strength  that  is 
forging  him  through  rushing  walls  of  water 
towards  the  haven  ahead  and  when  “She”  takes 
him  past  the  breakwater  into  harbor  his  feeling 
approximates  sheer  affection .  An  advertisement 
shot  through  with  the  gold  of  such  imagination 
must  necessarily  contain  qualities  that  unimagi¬ 
native  announcements  lack. 

To  the  grown-up  the  woods  at  night — are 
the  woods  at  night.  But  what  of  the  child? 
To  the  budding  boy  or  girl  in  whose  mind 
imagination  has  woven  its  magic  threads  those 
woods  abound  in  sprites,  fairies,  imps  and 
gnomes  who,  in  glades  glamored  by  the  moon 
above,  give  rein  to  their  impish,  elfish  tricks. 

Imagination  enables  us  to  conjure  up  things 
we  have  seen  but  do  not  see  now  (with  material 
eyes)  and  make  them  live  again,  vivid  and  real 
and  actual,  and  it  also  enables  us  to  take  the 
things  we  see  and  give  them  properties  or 
qualities  the  unimaginative  do  not  see.  I  will 
point  out  the  value  of  the  first  quality  in  the 
work  of  letter  writing  directly;  as  regards  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


43 


second  quality  it  must  be  plain  that  the  faculty 
is  of  tremendous  advantage  because,  possess¬ 
ing  it,  we  can  not  alone  make  ourselves  see  what 
we  conjure  up,  but  others  also. 

Imagination,  in  its  finest  form,  is  a  construc¬ 
tive  force  in  the  work  of  the  world  because  it 
dowers  logic  and  reason  with  a  sub-normal  sense 
that  carries  it  past  its  own  limitations  into  a 
still  greater  sphere.  Many  scientists  and  inven¬ 
tors  have  achieved  their  ultimate  goal  through 
pushing  reason  and  experiment  to  the  utmost 
limits  and  bridging  the  gap  with  imaginative 
power  that  saw  things  that  did  exist,  but  which 
imagination  alone  made  plain. 


A  writer  capable  of  self-analysis  can  observe 
himself  working  in  pictures  that  flash  before 
his  mind  like  those  thrown  on  the  screen 
by  the  cinematograph  and  which  he  trans¬ 
fers  to  paper  by  the  symbols  called  words 
and  his  power  as  a  writer  is  gauged  in 
precise  degree  by  his  power  to  make  those 
symbols  he  puts  down  flash  back  to  the  brain  of 
the  reader  those  pictures  that  have  passed  before 
his  brain.  The  best  results,  from  writer  and 
reader,  come  when  both  have  the  faculty  of 
imagination,  therefore;  some  men  lack  it,  and 
these  men,  whatever  their  other  qualifications, 
can  never  become  either  good  writers  or  good 
readers;  it  takes  an  imaginative  man  to  read 
and  appreciate  Shakespeare  or  other  great  poets. 


44 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Imagination,  we  have  found,  is  a  useful  tool 
in  business  writing;  if  you  aspire  to  success  in 
this  field  you  must  either  have  it,  or  you  must 
cultivate  it.  Read  the  following  words;  if  they 
conjure  up  pictures,  scenery,  ocean  sky  and 
beach  and  cliff-  in  your  mind,  then  you  have 
imagination. 

“ Sunset  and  evening  stary 

And  one  clear  call  for  me 

And  may  there  be  no  moaning  of  the  bary 

When  I  put  out  to  seay 

But  such  a  tide  as  moving  seems  asleepy 

Too  full  for  sound  and  foam , 

When  that  which  drew  from  out  the  boundless  deep 
Turns  again  home” 

Given  that  first  line,  if  an  artist,  could  you 
sketch  a  picture  from  it?  Do  you  see  that 
picture  now? 

Again : — 

“ And  the  stately  ship  glides  on 

To  its  haven  under  the  hill 

But  oh  for  the  touch  of  a  vanished  hand , 

And  the  sound  of  a  voice  that  is  still” 

Take  the  simple  child-song  and  see  how  it 
abounds  in  pictures'. 

“The  sun  is  careering 
In  glory  and  in  might , 

’ Mid  the  deep  blue  sky 
And  the  cloudlets  white . 

The  air  and  the  waters 
Dance ,  glitter  and  playy 
And  why  should  not  I 
Be  as  merry  as  they  ?” 

Do  pictures  flash  through  your  mind  as  you 
read  those  lines?  Do  you  see  what  the  writer 
saw ,  reduced  to  word  symbols,  and  endeavored 
to  flash  back  to  your  brain?  If  you  do,  you 
have  imagination. 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


45 


Take  your  wife — can  you  see  her  now?  Not 
think  of  her,  but  actually  see  her  as  you  left  her 
this  morning?  Can  you  see  the  breakfast  table 
as  you  came  to  it?  Can  you  see  the  parlor  of 
your  home — the  interior  of  your  church — the 
face  of  your  friend?  All  right,  you  can;  then 
talk  to  him  of  something  mutually  known  that 
is  of  mutual  interest.  Now,  can  you  see  his 
expression  change  as  you  talk,  now  attentive, 
now  sympathetic,  now  eager?  Can  you  see  his 
eyes  light  with  the  spirit  of  fun,  or  mischief,  or 
adventure?  If  so,  you  have  Imagination  and 
it  is  strong  or  weak  in  precise  degree  to  the 
clearness  or  otherwise  of  the  objects  you  take 
to  try  these  tests  on. 

I  wound  my  last  chapter  up  with  these  words: 
“Bring  this  man  opposite  another  man  and  watch 
him  warm  up  and  tell  and  demonstrate  what  he 
has  till  he  has  the  other  fellow  convinced  in 
spite  of  Hell.  Why?  Because  a  living,  breath¬ 
ing  man  is  before  him  into  whose  face  and  eyes 
he  can  look  and  watch  and  he  stimulated  by  the 
effect  of  his  words  as  mirrored  in  the  other’s 
countenance. 

“Take  this  man  and  place  him  opposite  a 
typewriter,  a  blank  sheet  of  paper,  and  an 
envelope,  and  watch  what  happens;  his  eyes 
see  material  where  before  they  saw  spiritual 
things;  he  is  no  longer  faced  with  flesh  and 
blood  and  heart  and  brain  and  soul  and  spirit, 
but  with  cold,  immobile  dead  things — he  is 
demagnetized." 


46 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


But  not  if  he  posesses  Imagination.  Through 
that  precious  faculty,  “The  eye  of  the  soul,” 
he  still  faces  a  human  being  and  as  he  talks  to 
him  through  writing  symbols  he  can  watch  his 
expression  change  as  he  brings  him  through  the 
stages  of  Attention,  Interest,  Desire  and  Action. 
Imagination  has  transformed,  a  purely  mechani¬ 
cal  rule  or  principle  into  a  thing  of  pulsing  life 
and  we  deal  again,  in  the  solitude  of  office  or 
den,  with  living  men  and  women. 

Now  perhaps  you  see  the  tremendous  value 
of  Imagination  in  advertising — you  see  the 
faculty  of  the  poet  is  also  the  faculty  of  the  plain 
prose  business  writer,  and.  realizing  that  truth, 
you  will  be  better  able  to  appreciate  those 
words  of  Arthur  Brisbane,  who  said: 

“The  ancient  poet  was  a  troubadour,  telling  the  story  of  his  hero 
in  rhyme. 

“The  modern  poet  is  the  advertising  writer,  telling  his  story  in 
plain  prose,  as  a  rule,  realizing  that  truth  poetically  told  is  what 
makes  business  and  success. 

“Mr.  Business  Man,  why  do  you  admire  certain  great  figures 
in  history? 

“You  admire  them  because  of  what  able  writers  have  told  you 
about  them. 

“If  you  expect  the  world  to  admire  you ,  patronize  you ,  regard 
your  energy,  and  make  you  rich,  you  must  have  an  able  writer  to 
tell  about  you ,  and  he  must  be  an  advertiser  who  understands  the 
poetry  of  business  as  well  as  the  commonplace  prose  of  business — 
one  who  can  give  the  whole  buying  world  a  just  estimate  of  your 
value  and  what  you  are  doing.'' 

I  have  indicated  the  business  value  of  that 
phase  of  imagination  that  can  conjure  up  a 
thing  or  a  person  seen  or  known  in  the  past  and 
bring  that  thing  or  person  into  the  living  present; 
Mr.  Brisbane  in  the  above  words  indicates  the 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


47 


value  of  that  phase  of  imagination  that  “Adorns 
whatever  it  touches  *  *  *  with 

unlooked  for  beauty.” 

This  has  its  dramatic  side;  a  man  starts  in 
business;  he  lacks  capital;  energy  and  ambition 
take  the  place  of  it;  he  fights  a  losing  battle 
against  the  forces  of  giant  competition  market¬ 
ing  against  him  by  sheer  weight  of  money;  our 
young  business  man  is  poor  but  imaginative, — 

“ When  I  could  not  sleep  for  cold 
I  had  fire  enough  in  my  brain , 

And  builded  with  roofs  of  gold 
My  beautiful  castles  in  Spain'' 

And,  if  his  thoughts  and  tendencies  run  to 
advertising,  his  genius  will  find  in  the  coldness 
and  deadliness  of  business  poverty  the  brain- 
fire  that  will  build  figments  of  imaginative 
thought  into  the  product  he  makes,  showing 
qualities  that  are  there,  but  which  ordinarily 
are  not  seen,  in  a  light  that  will  cause  them  to 
glitter  and  glow  and  attract. 

That  man  will  give  prosaic  things  like  soaps 
and  powders  and  fabrics  a  halo  of  fancy  that 
will  endear  them  to  the  hearts  of  millions  and 
bring  them  into  millions  of  homes,  lifting  him 
to  the  golden  throne  of  independence  and  wealth 
in  the  process. 


CHAPTER  SEVEN 


While  fancy ,  like  the  finger  of  a  clock , 

Runs  the  great  circuit  and  is  still  at  home . — Cowper. 

Mine  eyes  he  closed ,  but  open  left  the  cell  of  Fancy,  my  immorta 
sight . — Milton. 

Imagination ,  where  it  is  truly  creative ,  is  a  faculty  and  not  a 
quality ;  it  looks  before  and  after ,  it  gives  the  form  that  makes  all  the 
parts  work  together  harmoniously  toward  a  given  end ,  its  seat  is  in  the 
higher  reason ,  and  it  is  efficient  only  as  a  servant  of  the  will . — Lowell. 

IN  our  previous  chapter  I  dwelt  upon  the 
importance  of  imagination  in  letter  writing 
and  demonstrated,  I  hope,  the  general 
method  of  application.  Now  for  concrete  in¬ 
stances;  in  explaining  this  phase  of  our  subject 
I  naturally  cannot  enter  into  and  describe  the 
thoughts  and  feelings  of  other  men,  so,  to  be 
accurate,  I  am  forced  to  analyze  and  describe 
my  own.  In  view  of  this  fact  1  hope  the  reader 
will  forgive  any  apparent  egotism  in  the  under¬ 
standing  that  the  treatment  of  the  subject  ren¬ 
ders  necessary  the  pronoun  “I.” 

Now,  when  I  sit  down  to  write  a  letter  I  have 
a  subject  which  may  be  books,  medicines,  instru¬ 
ments,  tools,  money,  stocks,  bonds,  promotions, 
filters,  gloves  or  anything  else. 

I  propose  to  talk  that  subject  to  thousands  of 
persons  by  medium  of  the  letter  I  am  to  write. 
My  first  step  is  to  ascertain  as  nearly  as  I  can 
from  the  attributes  surrounding  the  subject 
(price,  quality,  etc.),  the  type  of  man  or  woman 
it  would  appeal  to  most;  I  thus  get  a  composite 
person.  I  am  no  longer  talking  to  thousands 


50 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


of  people  but  to  someone  representative  of 
those  thousands. 

Having  got  my  composite  person  fairly  well 
fixed  in  my  mind  I  next  run  back  over  the  list 
of  actual  persons  I  know  or  have  known  and 
select  the  one  that  approximates  closely  in 
characteristics  to  the  composite  person  drawn. 
The  latter  is  then  dropped  from  my  mind  as 
the  artificial  thing  it  is  and  I  am  face  to  face 
with  a  living  man  (or  woman). 

SELLING  THE  HARDWARE  MAN. 

Back  in  a  little  seaport  town  in  New  York 
lives  a  shrewd,  close-buying,  intelligent  hard¬ 
ware  man  through  whom  I  have  often  bought. 
He  doesn’t  buy  “shoddy”  stuff;  he  has  in  fact 
a  remarkable  knack  of  getting  the  top  best  the 
market  affords  at  the  lowest  price;  he  is  in 
effect,  and  in  his  line,  a  natural  servant  to  the 
hardware  buying  public.  He  justifies  his  exist¬ 
ence  and  earns  his  profits. 

Now,  when  I  have  the  right  kind  of  hardware 
proposition  to  write  about  I  conjure  up  Charlie 
Best  (that  isn’t  his  name,  of  course)  and  run 
hard  facts  into  his  brain  for  five  minutes.  I  see 
the  effect  of  my  arguments,  and  I  know  if  I 
have  presented  the  thing  right  he  will  motion 
for  an  order  blank  without  saying  a  word.  If  I 
don’t  see  him  do  that  the  letter  is  ripped  up  and 
I  write  and  write  till  I  do. 

SELLING  THE  DOCTOR. 

In  a  wealthy  suburban  town  on  the  outskirts 
of  New  York  the  wants  of  the  community  are 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


51 


ministered  to  by  a  physician  of  whom  it  can 
first  be  said  he  is  a  gentleman,  by  birth  and 
breeding,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  term.  Dr. 
James  (the  name  will  serve)  keeps  abreast  of 
the  latest  discoveries  and  developments  in  his 
profession,  and,  when  something  really  worth 
while  comes  out,  he  has  the  money  to  buy, 
possessing  as  he  does  a  very  enviable  practice. 
If  I  have  medical  apparatus  or  service  to  sell  I 
conjure  up  Dr.  James  and  (provided  I  am  per¬ 
sonally  convinced  of  the  worth  of  what  I  have 
— to  him)  do  not  stop  till  I  have  his  check. 

I  know  just  how  to  talk  to  the  Doctor;  he  is 
a  finely  educated  physician,  a  profound  student 
of  psychology,  and  an  appreciative  reader  of 
the  great  poets.  There  is  a  touch  of  the  mystical 
in  his  nature  and  I  can  win  his  instant  attention 
by  striking  one  of  the  keynotes  that  characterize 
his  lines  of  thought.  He  is  representative  of 
thousands  in  his  class  and  when  I  sell  him  I 
know  I  have  sold  hundreds  with  him. 

SELLING  THE  HOUSEWIFE. 

Down  in  Maine  there  lives  a  shrewd  little 
woman  who,  as  the  mother  and  manager  of  a 
family  of  five,  limited  by  an  income  small,  as 
incomes  go,  knows  values  thoroughly ,  and  knows 
when  she  has  a  bargain  and  when  she  has  not. 
Verbiage  won’t  have  any  effect  on  Mrs.  Smith 
(which  name  will  serve)  and  if  by  any  misrepre¬ 
sentation  you  succeed  in  getting  goods  within 
her  doors  not  up  to  value  you  may  expect  them 
back  the  next  day. 


52 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


Mrs.  Smith  is  a  buyer  for  the  cheaper  grade 
of  goods  that  wear — she  is  typical  of  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  families  and  I  know  when  I 
have  sold  her  I  have  sold  a  very  large  proportion 
of  others  like  her. 

SELLING  THE  BUYER  OF  BOOKS 
In  Bridgeport,  Conn.,  lives  Ralph  (which 
isn’t  his  name)  an  erstwhile  college  boy,  now 
approaching  thirty,  yet  with  lots  of  boyish 
tricks  about  him  reminiscent  of  old  college  days. 

Ralph  writes  little  amateur  poems,  dramas, 
etc.,  and  is  studying  literature.  He  is  naturally 
a  book  lover,  so,  when  I  have  a  book  or  books 
to  sell  my  first  task  is  to  make  the  sale  to  Ralph; 
it  would  be  easy  if  he  had  the  money,  but  he 
isn’t  blessed  with  a  great  share  of  that  com¬ 
modity;  however,  given  the  right  book  and  the 
right  talk,  he  is  almost  a  certain  victim  on 
the  “Dollar  down  and  a  dollar  a  week”  plan,  so 
when  I  have  an  installment  proposition  on 
books  my  mind  hies  forth  to  Ralph  because  I 
know  when  I  have  sold  him  I  have  sold  hun¬ 
dreds  of  his  type. 

SELLING  THE  SPECULATOR. 

Down  South  I  have  a  speculator  (he  would 
hate  to  be  called  that,  but  he  is).  He  considers 
himself  an  investor;  the  only  trouble  with  that 
adopted  definition  is  that  Charlie’s  “invest¬ 
ments”  all  stand  in  to  pay  him  (on  their  own 
showing)  thousands  per  cent  if  he  wins.  Occa¬ 
sionally  he  does,  and  the  winners  have  so  far 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


53 


kept  him  sufficiently  well  ahead  of  the  game  to 
be  able  to  “plunge”  when  any  good  looking 
venture  comes  along.  Charlie  isn’t  a  “sucker” 
by  any  means.  He  is  simply  that  type  of  busi¬ 
ness  man  that  balances  chances  and  is  willing 
to  take  one  personally  if  they  seem  to  favor 
him  or  the  project  he  goes  into.  You  would 
waste  time  talking  “hot  air”  to  Charlie,  but 
take  him  a  sound  idea  and  he’s  “In  on  it.” 

When  I  have  a  speculative  proposition  upon 
which  I  have  myself  been  convinced  I  conjure 
up  Charlie  and  lay  it  before  him;  his  type  is 
numerous,  and  when  I  have  him  sold  I  have 
hundreds  of  thousands  sold. 

SELLING  THE  BANKER. 

Down  in  the  New  York  financial  district  in 
“The  little  crooked  street  with  a  graveyard  at 
one  end  and  a  river  at  the  other”  waiting  for 
the  unfortunates  who  face  grim  Despair  within 
its  boundaries,  a  great  banker  has  offices.  His 
hobby  is  automobiles.  He  wants  and  will  have, 
if  money  can  buy  it,  the  automobile  that  is  king 
of  the  road.  If  I  have  that  type  of  automobile 
to  sell  I  naturally  and  automatically  conjure 
him  up  because  he  is  representative  of  a  thousand 
and  one  millionaires  who  buy  with  him. 

So  the  list  runs;  over  a  period  of  twenty  years 
I  have  met  so  many  men  of  special  types  and 
characteristics  that  it  has  become  easy  to  pick 
out  from  those  I  know  the  one  man  to  whom  the 
proposition  will  especially  appeal. 


54 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


That  man,  on  each  proposition,  I  pick  out 
and  write  to  and  at.  I  am  opposite  to  him  in 
his  home  or  office  as  I  write,  by  and  through 
that  gift  or  faculty  of  imagination  which  Wash¬ 
ington  Irving  classed  as:  “The  divine  attribute 
that  is  irrepressible,  unconfinable;  that  when 
the  real  world  is  shut  out  can  create  a  world  for 
itself,  and  with  necromantic  power  conjure  up 
shapes  and  forms  and  visions  to  make  solitude 
populous.” 

FROM  PHANTASY  TO  REALITY 

What  is  there  to  it?  I  do  not  know!  I  can 
only  say  that  this  is  my  method,  and  through 
that  method  I  have  achieved  results — sometimes 
wonderful  results.  I  have  imaged  a  great  life 
insurance  company  and  watched  it  assume 
physical  form  and  actuality  from  the  mists  of 
erstwhile  fancy.  I  have  screened  on  my  brain 
the  picture  of  a  great  factory  through  the  doors 
of  which  poured  hundreds  of  men  who  set  in 
motion  whirring  machines — and  saw  the  thing 
grow  as  I  rubbed  the  magic  lamp!  I  have 
visioned  a  great  magazine  sending  words  of 
comfort  and  cheer  to  thousands  of  hearts 
sheltered  beneath  old  rooftrees — and  saw  the 
thing  done  even  as  I  thought! 

I  have  seen  three  hundred  thousand  dollars 
worth  of  automobiles  swept  off  the  sales  floor 
within  a  week  by  men  to  whose  brains  I  had 
flashed  a  picture  of  the  machine  that  appealed 
to  them  and  I  have  seen  factory  and  office 
powerless  to  cope  with  the  flood  of  orders 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


55 


engendered  through  the  faculty  to  accurately 
vision  the  type  and  class  of  men  who  would 
buy  on  a  certain  appeal. 

THE  MESSAGE’S  THE  THING. 

What  I  have,  and  what  I  know,  is  given  as 
fully  and  as  freely  as  it  has  been  tendered  to 
me,  and  I  am  glad  if,  as  a  result  of  these  chap¬ 
ters  on  the  wonder-worker,  IMAGINATION,  I 
am  able  to  set  the  feet  of  others  on  the  road  to 
success  through  the  art  of  resultful  letter  writing. 

What  I  have  done  I  have  always  felt  should 
have  been  done,  and  the  wonder  to  me  is  that 
I  have  never  wondered  at  what  came — I  have 
accepted  results  as  the  inevitable  consequence 
of  certain  prior  acts  and  would  have  felt  natural 
laws  had  played  me  false  if  those  results  had 
not  come. 

It  should  not  of  course  be  thought  that  the 
results  accomplished  in  specific  cases  have 
sprung  absolutely  and  entirely  from  the  letter, 
as  the  term  is  narrowly  understood,  though  the 
letter  (or  letters)  have  formed,  in  their  letter 
form,  an  important  and  essential  part  of  the 
campaign.  I  consider  an  enclosure,  folder  or 
booklet  an  extension  of  the  letter  proper ,  precisely 
as  the  telescope  is  an  extension  of  the  faculty 
of  sight. 

Primarily  and  basically  a  man  is  reached  and 
influenced  through  a  message  conveyed  to  him 
through  the  mails,  and  that  message  is  essentially 
the  same  whether  in  the  form  of  a  letter  of 


56 


THE  ART  OF  RESULTFUL  LETTER  WRITING 


twenty-five  pages,  or  a  letter  of  one  page  and  a 
related  booklet  of  twenty-four  pages  that  extends 
the  letter  in  the  more  convenient  form  of  a 
booklet. 

Some  day,  I  hope,  I  will  be  privileged  to 
present  to  the  readers  of  The  Mailbag  the  ideas, 
principles  and  methods  I  use  in  extending  the 
letter  into  accompanying  booklet,  that  of  course 
presupposing  a  series  of  articles  on  the  prepara¬ 
tion  of  that  very  important  advertising  device 
— the  booklet  itself. 


